Homeless rate grows in Gladstone

There are concerns the mining boom is causing a rise in homelessness at Gladstone, due to low rental vacancies in the central Queensland city.

Community worker Julie McLean says homelessness is a major problem in Gladstone because affordable accommodation is now out of reach of many people.

She says some workers are sleeping in their cars, caravan parks or tents due to low rental vacancies in the city.

Ms McLean says local families are also affected.

"We have people sleeping rough in cars - I met a whole family during the homeless census, living under a bridge, and young people everywhere," she said.

"The worst part of the situation appears to be that the majority of these people are working and homeless because we don't have the infrastructure here to carry the amount of people coming to Gladstone to work.

"We've got people who are earning $2,000 a week after tax and they cannot get themselves a house."

Several liquefied natural gas (LNG) companies have committed to building more housing in Gladstone.

However, the independent Member for Gladstone, Liz Cunningham, says the city's homelessness problem will worsen before it gets better.

Mrs Cunningham says the State Government has failed to take early action to provide affordable housing for people affected by rent hikes in the city.

She says projects that are underway will not help to relieve the pressure on residents until they are completed in up to a year.

Mrs Cunningham also says the majority of people who are struggling do not work in the gas or resources sector.

"They're the ones that I've been worried about - the ones who work in the service industries.

"It's the people who are under the $40,000 income that are really disadvantaged and if you are on $35,000, pity help you.

"There's been precious little done in the formative time of all this industry to assist these people."

Housing program

Meanwhile, the Urban Land Development Authority (ULDA) says a pilot program to provide affordable housing in Gladstone could be rolled out to Blackwater and Emerald as well. \

The Priority Home Buyer Initiative aims to build 12 homes at Clinton in Gladstone in the first half of next year in stage one of the project.

ULDA chief executive Paul Eagles says while 37 applications were submitted by yesterday's deadline, there were more than 240 application forms downloaded from the website.

He says the program offers homes to local residents who earn under $100,000 a year.

"We work with the builders to ensure that the prices for the homes are actually set, these are nominated at the time when they're sent to the people who've registered and they'll be sent out this week," he said.

"They'll be in the range to $350,000 to slightly above $400,000."

He says if the pilot is successful it will be rolled out in other areas.

"We'll test it and then we'll introduce stages two and three, but we believe it's not just Gladstone that this will be relevant for, but perhaps places like Moranbah and Gladstone where we're also involved," he said.

"If this pilot project works well, we'll be rolling it out in those towns as well.

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